Bloody hell! More painting and posts!

In a shocking turn of events I have managed to paint a couple more things!

A War Drum for my Kings of War Hobgoblin/Orc army, using an old Citadel Orc, a scratch built drum and some press moulded shields. 

The drum needs to be guled in place, varnish and flock have to be applied - but looking good me thinks. 

Also finished Elric of Melnibone/Vampire Lord - looks better in the metal than these pictures. 

Since I took the photos I have painted his sword black as I was having difficulties getting a clean edge - partly due to breaking the sword while cleaning the mini and not getting the pinning right while trying to fix it. Nevermind. 

Morts

Not long to Games Expo. 

Skeletons - some actual painting done.

So I have finished (possibly) painting the undead! 

The final batch of mantic skellies are done to populate Frostgrave, Dragon Rampant and a small Kings of War force. 

Varnish and basing needs to be done. The possibly comment is due to painting up an old Elric mini seen lurking in the background as a vampire Lord - which Eliric sort of looked like anyway so might be just painting as Elric. 

Hopefully I'll try an get an showcase for this lot soon - so possibly before Christmas. 

The weekend ahead brings little excursion to UK GamesExpo - hopefully a good day out, like last year. The Toby breakfast already planned in the the schedule. 

Morts

Legionary 2018 - a day out.

Steedo, DK, Snake-eyes and myself made the short trip to the Isca game show - all of us put stuff on the bring and buy. There were a good number of traders at the show. There were a good number of very good demo games. 

We managed to get two participation games. Before lunch we had a go at Crooked Dice's 7TV. We had a faction each and where hunting for a nuclear device in a shipping container. DK's super spy found it first, while Snake-eye's villain decided to kill Steedo's crimeboss' dogs - most bizarre. The game buzzed along at a fair rate with some interesting mechanisms and card play. One of the party commented on that it was a bit like frostgrave set in the 70s TV. 

The set up for 7TV was really good - and they even do Sylons - pity he couldn't be there. 

After a hearty lunch we had game of Aristeia! - an arena sports game. This was an interesting game with area control for scoring points and a system where your "dead" players could come back in an advantageous position - DK and I lined up against Snake-eyes (Steedo had gone fora wander and to see if he'd won on the raffle). At the start of the game DK and I were rolling well and kicked butt - but as the game progressed our early use of cards and having "killed" Snake-eyes players earlier he was able to move the scoring zone around and win. 

We should have said at the start of the games that we only wanted a taster and play for half to one hour. Both the games played lasted about 2 hours which was a little too long - actually quiet a bit too long for a taster. 

Anyway a good day - with sales made on the bring and buy. 

Morts

Actually managed to play some games.

After many weeks doing building work - we have put two field shelters at the back of the house to use as carports. These have taken more time than to do than I hoped and there is still more to do to finish off. Anyway Steedo and myself headed over to DK's to play and couple of games. 

First up was Viticulture Tuscany - a game of planting, growing and harvesting grapes and turning them into wine.

To be honest while DK was doing the rules explanation I was wondering why I would want to play this game - it certainly didn't grab me as a theme that would make a good game. 

However the game did actually play well, with some really interesting mechanics. Getting your "engine" of how to produce the wine required some thinking about - some grapes needed trellis and or irrigation. The type of grapes you can plant are picked from a deck of cards, as are the types of wine you can sell. Mix in the fact you chose the order you go in each year causes some serious thinking to be done. As it was I managed to produce the most and best wine, but due to selling wine cards not coming out in the right order I couldn't sell any of the stuff. Also if your vines produce to much you can't make blush or fizzy wine!

So the game is a frustrating one, which Steedo won, closely followed by DK and myself in last place. 

Certainly worth a replay in the future.  

We then moved on to a semi-cooperative game with a traitor/saboteur machanic - called Saboteur, strangely enough. The aim of the game is to place cards to reach the gold nuggets.

This should be fairly straight forward - unless the saboteur breaks your tools or creates a cave in to break the run back to the start. The first dwarf to the gold gets the pick of the cards from the gold nugget - so being first to the gold does mean the game is only semi-cooperative. So with this in mind we started the first game and it was quickly apparent that Steedo was the saboteur .... But then DK to ensure I wouldn't get pick of the cards broke my pick axe .... and he wasn't a saboteur! As it was Steedo won the round (getting 4 gold). The second game when the same way, but DK at least realised that we had to work together to get the gold .... But Steedo stopped us again (about 4 gold). In the final run in DK was the saboteur, but Steedo and managed to get to the gold - for the first time, where Steedo picked up 3 more gold, and I got one. The final scores Steedo 11, Morts 1 and DK 0 (and deservedly so!). 

A good evening for Steedo. 

Next up Exeter wargames show.

Morts